Computer Museum - Big visitor day with Techies from Rackspace in Blacksburg Virginia

Bugbooks

Rackspace

 A big Thank You to Rex, Samuel, Bill, Brad, Nicole, Andrew, Adam, Lauren, Alexander, Jiger, Tommy and all the others from Rackspace in Blacksburg Virginia that visited our " Bugbook Microcomputer Museum". The visit started for the 17 from Rackspace with me as their guest for lunch at the El  Charro Mexican Grill here in Floyd Virginia. A lot of questions at lunch - How did you get started collecting microcomputers? What is the story of you turning down a career with the CIA?  How did you get computers into the Soviet Union by writing to Soviet President Gorbachev. I had an opportunity to ask questions about their work at Rackspace.

The tour of the museum started with me telling of my background in electronics/computers and the 40 years of collecting historical computers. It is always enjoyable for me to reminisce --- You can't live in the past, however it is sure fun to share the good experiences.  I have been blessed in so many ways during my 75 years and perhaps I can be an inspiration for of the younger folks.

The visitors really seemed to enjoy browsing & looking at the displays.  The museum contains many computers that most have not had the opportunity to see or hear about.  Many of our guests are much younger than the computers in the displays.  Lots of comments-LOOK I used one of those or questions like - Do you have one of the first Commodore computers?  Always questions about the 75 books in the "Blacksburg Continuing Education Series" of books about electronics & computers - a lot of interest & questions.

We are always happy to host groups of visitors and will be moving to a much better location that is twice as large as our current area.  The move will take place in March and all our museum curators are excited to have more space for more computers on display.

                                                         Click to enlarge photos

The whole Group from Rackspace in Blacksburg Virginia

Bugbook Historical Microcomputer Museum

The computer displays generated some interesting discussions about vintage computing.

Computer Museum Floyd Virginia

The museum has a very good representation of Pre1980 microcomputers - The very first computer construction article in Radio Electronics June 1974-Jon Titus published his design of the Mark 8 a microcomputer based on the 8008 microprocessor chip. Lots of questions and photos of this one.

The museum collection contains nearly 1000 vintage calculators 

The Laptop computers weighings as much as 25 pounds viewed with amazement when compared to the present Ipads. You can tell is was a cold day outside with everyone still wearing their coats inside the museum. It was about 15 degrees outside but nice and warm inside.



Interview with Andrew Mussey one of the Rackspace visitors to our Museum

David G Larsen

Thank you Rex and all the folks from Rackspace for the lunch and visiting our "Bugbook Historical Microcomputer Museum" in Floyd, Virginia. The museum represents a small part of our 40 years of collecting historical computers. It has been a very fun and interesting time for me. I am happy to have the opportunity  to show some of the vintage computers to my friends and visitors.
^{"by David Larsen"  KK4WW Computer Collector Historian}   
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